Smart TVs have a serious communication problem

And it's a major reason why they have yet to catch on.

The remote and visual interface for DISH Network's Hopper, a DVR service that requires you to peck out text letter by letter.

Casey Johnston

Smart TVs are the new fashionable thing for popular TV-manufacturing companies to push on consumers. But we’ve still yet to see a really compelling, easy-to-use product trotted out—from CES or anywhere else. The more rounds that smart TVs go on the shelves at electronics expos, the more they seem to suffer from the same fundamental problem: a failure to communicate, or more appropriately, a failure to receive communication.

Internet-connected TVs that provide functionality beyond simple video displays have been on the agenda for nearly two decades. Despite the age of the technology and the fact that new smart TVs piggyback on possibly the most prevalent non-essential household electronic device (tablets), they’ve still failed to become a compelling device.

As screens move closer and closer to our laps in the form of notebooks, tablets, and smartphones, the TV is insistent on remaining at a distance. This is partly out of necessity—once a screen is in someone’s lap, it becomes a solo experience, difficult to share with people around them. But as smart TV functionality grows, our ability to communicate across the living room needs to grow with it. Manufacturers haven’t quite streamlined a way for us to shout across the abyss (metaphorically or literally) and make our wishes known to that increasingly thin box.

Even going as far back as plain TV remotes, the control experience of TVs has nearly always been user-hostile. Modern remotes are littered with often-inscrutable buttons (“sub.code”?) some with multiple functions (“comp/mix”?), and only a few are used regularly. Multiply that by a remote for every component connected to your TV, and reading a book instead doesn't sound so bad after all. Though some third parties had success unifying control of various devices with one remote, like the Logitech Harmony series, the industry failed to solve the control scheme problem for TV even when TVs were only a matter of channels, volume, and inputs.

Who's designing these things?

IPTV’s emergence preceded the smart TV. While the term has more to do with how content is served than what the TV does, it’s a close relative on the user end. Time-shifted viewing and interaction with broadcasts created more options, requiring more controls and complicating the interaction between a TV and a viewer. Now manufacturers want to give them apps, social media, and Web browsers, but this only multiplies the communication problem that was never really solved in the first place.

The IPTV control schemes of yore are, to put it lightly, design nightmares. Keyboards that were either fat and ugly or miniaturized for one hand, and mice or touchpads that have to work with poorly scaled displays for viewing, typing, or manipulating text. Those controls may have been better than using a remote’s hard buttons to scroll around an alphabet on a screen and enter text letter by letter, but not by much. In newer remotes, some of the more inscrutable buttons are eliminated and replaced with keyboards. Their settings may be offloaded to an interactive onscreen menu, but that doesn’t make access any quicker or less complex.

Now, television manufacturers don’t just want viewers to be able to watch what they want, when they want. TV interfaces are being imbued with Web browsers, Twitter, Texas Hold ‘Em, Google Talk, photo browsers, plus a bundle of other content delivery and recommendation services. It's clear from the marketing that companies want smart TVs to be the center of a home. But TVs feel like babies, and we’re the parents who have taught them to say and mean the word “dada.” Now the baby is trying to write a dissertation on the human condition as informed by usage of Hulu and Netflix. It hurts to watch. It’s not going to work.

LG's Google-TV powered set—lots to do, no good way to accomplish it.

Instead of significantly improving the physical input mechanisms TVs cling to or eliminating them, many manufacturers are simply adding new control schemes on top of them. There's a camera to accept gestures and a microphone to hear speech commands, all alongside a remote still littered with buttons, possibly a touchpad, and sometimes a joystick.

We might say the problem has now been reversed: at first we couldn’t communicate enough, quickly enough, with a TV to bear interaction with it for too long. Now, there are so many ways to reach it, the optimal method of communication changes depending on what you’re trying to do. We're left constantly cycling between them.

Granular UI navigation, such as selecting between individual items, might be easier with remote buttons because they’re precise. Paging along swaths of content in a catalog may be easier with the voice command “next page” or even better, a gesture swipe to either side (rather than using the separate remote button to “page,” which shouldn’t exist, as it adds to the button overpopulation problem).

Playing or pausing content is easier with buttons than waking up a camera or microphone to listen to or see your command. Scrubbing through to a particular location seems best suited to a gesture or voice command. All of these things can be accomplished with any of the input devices; it’s a matter of figuring out which one is best for every single interaction you’re trying to have. Rather than solving the negatives of each communication medium or working around it, companies are layering them on top of the other to solve each problem. This puts the onus of figuring out what is actually effective on the user.

The front side of a Google TV remote for an LG TV. Buttons are pared down from a normal remote, even though interactions are more complex, which is commendable.

The reverse side of a Google TV remote: a full keyboard.

Until this point, we’ve laid aside the issue of whether these new input methods work well. Voice control and gestures are not new, but still, what we saw at CES this past January did not impress us. Even in a quiet room at Samsung’s booth—with the microphone remote placed firmly in front of a demonstrator’s face—a new smart TV misunderstood simple commands repeatedly. Gestures are more the domain of separate components like Microsoft’s Kinect, but Samsung recently started to add cameras to its smart TVs as well. As a whole, the gesture input method remains imprecise and unsteady.

As we mentioned earlier, above all of this, the screens of TVs are still a problem when it comes to interaction. They’re still across the room, trying to communicate a large amount of info. For an interface to handle a large number of options on one display, the features and text must be relatively small. Inherently, this means they’re difficult to see at a distance.

One solution is to reduce the number of features on the screen—for instance, putting 16 app or video options per menu page instead of 24—but then the amount of navigation you have to do to see everything goes up. In a browser, manufacturers can make the onscreen navigation tools bigger, but that only makes it harder to see what you're trying to see. The interaction remains difficult, just in a different way.

If the screen is sufficiently big, the features likewise become bigger, so you can sort of mitigate the problem by buying a larger TV. But then you’re spending more money, giving up more space, and compromising your possible viewing comfort of video content just to accommodate new functionalities.

If we want to interact with most gadgets, we get close to them and touch them. Entertainment systems’ problem of communicating with That Thing Over There, the remoteness, is rare in consumer technology. Many problems stand in the way of the viewer-TV interaction working on all of these new levels like browsing and apps. So far, manufacturers seem to be trying to solve it with the addition of mediocre interaction schemes. Perhaps they would be better served by making one—at most two—controls robust and high quality, with as little overlap as possible. Otherwise, we’re spending all this money to do the same thing we always do: zone out to a marathon of How It’s Made on the Science channel.

Promoted Comments

The biggest issue of smart tv is not the input devices, but software. Will Tv manufacturers provide updates once a year for 10-20 years. We buy TV's to last at least a decade. In 10 years will I still be getting security and software updates for my TV?

Take a look at android fragmentation and update issues by manufactuers and remember there is no standard SmartTV OS. I would be willing to bet the smart TV you buy today wont get security patches next year.

212 Reader Comments

The top of the nerdiness scale (no disrespect, I am here) use an HTPC and maybe a NAS.

Just below that are gamers... who have a PS3/360/WiiU and will inevitably own a PS4/720 or something that can stream... so that rules them out as potential customers.

Kind of an aside to gamers are audiophiles/videophiles who likely have a Blu-Ray player of some sort that has these features.

Below that are the "Tech" (Apple/Google) crowd, and they'd rather pay the premium to Apple/Google and get an AppleTV/GoogleTV.

Then you start getting into "Mom" and "Dad" territory. Who use facebook MAYBE once a week at most... if at all. Who browse the web only to look up Dr Oz health tips and actively search for viruses (at least that's what it appears to me.)

Then there's the Amish, and I don't think they want a TV.

Which demographic are Smart TVs directed at? I never see major market foothold simply because alternatives (Roku) are so much cheaper and work SO freaking well. People willing to pay $400-500 premium for their TV are also probably willing to shell out for a Roku and a HarmonyOne... which will likely perform both tasks infinitely better than the products on the market.

The biggest issue of smart tv is not the input devices, but software. Will Tv manufacturers provide updates once a year for 10-20 years. We buy TV's to last at least a decade. In 10 years will I still be getting security and software updates for my TV?

Take a look at android fragmentation and update issues by manufactuers and remember there is no standard SmartTV OS. I would be willing to bet the smart TV you buy today wont get security patches next year.

Oh, but the TV manufacturers would be thrilled if you had to buy a new TV every few years instead once in a decade or so.

A TV is not a computer. It's simple as that. A TV is not for gathering or consuming information. It's purely designed for consuming SIMPLE media/content in a passive way. And for the aforementioned reasons that'll never change. At least not in the foreseeable future..

I recall working at Zenith in 1985...they had a TV that gathered news headlines via extra space on the NTSC signal, probably on a 'SAP' channel....probably while SAP was still in the R&D/FCC process. (This was pre-stereo TV) WGN was working with Zenith and broadcasting these signals in Chicago. Didn't last long, I don't think the product ever went to market. Since then, interactive TV has always failed. Every time.

IMHO it will continue to fail because culturally TV is a passive event. We don't build our living rooms as a place to interact with the TV, we build them to sit back and be entertained, more-or-less passively.

Perhaps our viewing culture is shifting, but if it does then we run into this morass of controls and interfaces which are impenetrable to all but the most dedicated geeks. The TV industry has created standards for things before, maybe they can do it for controls and menus.

The problem with consumer electronics that is pushing the companies to go "smart" and "connected" is the same one that all the ISPs are chasing.

Your ISP doesn't want to become a dumb pipe that you buy services from 3rd parties over. Your TV is trying to prevent becoming a big monitor. Your blu ray player is trying to prevent becoming a DVD-ROM. Your receiver is trying to stay relevant. All of them wants to become the integration point for your entertainment center.

The problem with consumer electronics that is pushing the companies to go "smart" and "connected" is the same one that all the ISPs are chasing.

Your ISP doesn't want to become a dumb pipe that you buy services from 3rd parties over. Your TV is trying to prevent becoming a big monitor. Your blu ray player is trying to prevent becoming a DVD-ROM. Your receiver is trying to stay relevant. All of them wants to become the integration point for your entertainment center.

Your ISP may or may not want this to happen.

They will not want this if their infrastructure is unable to provide sufficient bandwidth for all the extra data usage.

They will want it to happen if they can withstand increase usage and charge you through the nose for all the extra load you place on their data lines.

I have a Samsung, and it can use a Bluetooth mouse and keyboard. Bluetooth can fail at high viewing distances, but works a treat otherwise.

Really, I don't have much of a communications problem with my Smart TV. The more annoying thing is that the TV isn't quite smart enough!

My top issues are (in no particular order)

1. Just ship a simple keyboard with touch pad with the TV, or fatten up the remote to include same. I don't see this as the big deal it's being made out to be.

2. Include more storage on the TV. When using streaming services, the inability to buffer reasonably more or less renders those functions useless for the vast majority of people.

3. Make the TV smarter by including, "dumb" mode. Yes, just give people an option to turn it into a passive TV, if they want to. I know, reduces the value added by "smart" but frankly, most people won't pay for it anyway.

4. If the TV's are gonna get smart, then make them actually work. My TV browser kind of does, but it can't do basic things I would want a TV browser to do. One of those was to stream MSNBC videos. I use OTA broadcast right now and have just an Internet connection. The idea that I could just ask for one of the shows was compelling. The result was just crappy and I ended up using a computer or game console when the TV should have done that nicely.

The biggest issue of smart tv is not the input devices, but software. Will Tv manufacturers provide updates once a year for 10-20 years. We buy TV's to last at least a decade. In 10 years will I still be getting security and software updates for my TV?

Take a look at android fragmentation and update issues by manufactuers and remember there is no standard SmartTV OS. I would be willing to bet the smart TV you buy today wont get security patches next year.

People who review these Smart TVs ought to make a point of asking the manufacturer about their plans for long-term support and updates. Does the manufacturer promise to provide updates for security concerns or bugged functionality in a timely fashion? If a content provider (e.g. Netflix or Hulu) changes their API to the point of breaking existing devices, how long will customers have to wait before the TV manufacturer provides an update?

Better still, we ought to have Congress enact a law forcing manufacturers to clearly state their policies up-front, on the product packaging as well as at the point of sale (e.g. store or website). That way, we'd at least be able to factor such things into our purchasing decisions.

The problem with consumer electronics that is pushing the companies to go "smart" and "connected" is the same one that all the ISPs are chasing.

Your ISP doesn't want to become a dumb pipe that you buy services from 3rd parties over. Your TV is trying to prevent becoming a big monitor. Your blu ray player is trying to prevent becoming a DVD-ROM. Your receiver is trying to stay relevant. All of them wants to become the integration point for your entertainment center.

And if one of them did it really well, they could grab a big piece of market. But all of them are doing it badly.

Samsung's "Smart" TV, my a**! Some time ago they released the really beautiful UE40D8090 with a very thin, silver frame around the display. So what do they do to "improve" on it with the next model? They mount a zit-like camera on top, completely messing up the elegant design just to add another layer of complexity by introducing gesture control that of course does not even work if you sit totally still in front of the TV (way to relax) and have no kids running around.

I guess streamlining the remote to keep only the most needed keys (volume, channel, input, play/pause) by removing all the clutter was just too obvious an improvement. And don't get me started on the horror that is rearranging the channel list (with crappy software on the PC).

The remotes are designed by certified misanthropes. I've had tiny pause and stop buttons right next to one another. I've had a backstep button millimeters away from the power button. Tiny FF and Rewind buttons straddling the stop button. Some you have to swear were *deliberately* designed to be annoying. Then everyone bashes Apple for at least trying over the years to make nice interfaces. This is the world you wrought, tech geeks. Live with it.

This is why I prefer to still by a 'regular' (read: non-smart TV) and hook up things to it. On our TV downstairs we have a Blue-Ray player with wifi so we can do everything with a smart TV from it. Across the hall, an Apple TV. Upstairs? An ultra-small, 5 year old computer. If anything gets outdated or is no longer supported, the cost of replacing or upgrading those devices are minimal.

I think TV manufacturers should be looking at what we connect to the TV's and fostering how those connections could be improved. Say I buy an LG TV and LG Blue-Ray player, those two should be able to talk better to each other.

Smart TV's are not needed when you already have DVD/BluRay players that can stream content from the internet s well as video gaming consoles which can do a better job. I'm also seeing a comeback of the HTPC. I have had more and more people asking me to build them a HTPC. TV's should be left to do what they do bast. Most people I know who bought a Smart TV regret it.

Smart TV's are not needed when you already have DVD/BluRay players that can stream content from the internet s well as video gaming consoles which can do a better job. I'm also seeing a comeback of the HTPC. I have had more and more people asking me to build them a HTPC. TV's should be left to do what they do bast. Most people I know who bought a Smart TV regret it.

HTPCs still suffer from the loosely associated parts flying in irregular formation. In other words not a seamless experience.

I think many of these product makers fail to realize that the more things you add to a product like a TV. The more complicated it becomes. I myself would not want to tie myself into a smart TV and be tied to whatever it offers or does not offer in the future. Nor do I need it to do things that my tablet, PC or smartphone already does. I do not want a "All in one device". What I want is a TV, a PC that's a PC and a tablet that's a tablet. If your not selling enough TV's then maybe your not making what people want or can afford? Just because technology can make it happen. Does not mean that it should.

The funny thing about the universal remote control problem is that, many many years ago, I had one. It was a PDA phone with an IR port, and it controlled everything in my house, from the TV to all its peripherals, the aircon, and just about everything that used IR for communication. 10 years into the future, and I need a dozen remote controls on my desk.

The biggest issue of smart tv is not the input devices, but software. Will Tv manufacturers provide updates once a year for 10-20 years. We buy TV's to last at least a decade. In 10 years will I still be getting security and software updates for my TV?

Take a look at android fragmentation and update issues by manufactuers and remember there is no standard SmartTV OS. I would be willing to bet the smart TV you buy today wont get security patches next year.

People who review these Smart TVs ought to make a point of asking the manufacturer about their plans for long-term support and updates. Does the manufacturer promise to provide updates for security concerns or bugged functionality in a timely fashion? If a content provider (e.g. Netflix or Hulu) changes their API to the point of breaking existing devices, how long will customers have to wait before the TV manufacturer provides an update?

Better still, we ought to have Congress enact a law forcing manufacturers to clearly state their policies up-front, on the product packaging as well as at the point of sale (e.g. store or website). That way, we'd at least be able to factor such things into our purchasing decisions.

Considering how equipment used in critical infrastructure suffered for security holes for years, and some of these are made by the very same companies that manufacture these TVs, I wouldn't get my hopes up.

I refuse to browse the internet on a stupid "smart" TV. I will take my web browsing from my refrigerator thank you.

Oddly enough I already find the browser on the 360 little more than a novelty really. With a controller I get Dreamcast flashbacks. The alternate method of using Smart Glass is by far much more intuitive...aside possibly from the fact that the Smart Glass device can probably browse on it's own and the only point to it on a TV is to show it to more people which the internet generally doesn't look very interesting in that venue. Although the Smart Glass concept does one thing, it distils controlling a multimedia device down to another device with a single necessary button.

The touch screen seems the best way to me to keep the remote looking "clean" and if the TV is "smart" it can organize it so that everything is easy to find. I highly doubt everyone in the room needs to see all the crippled apps you TV can attempt to run, only the person navigating needs to see them. The WiiU even managed this for some odd reason. The control screen doesn't need to have a fraction of the power even tablets have, let the TV do that. Throw in a small dock or easy STANDARD based way to keep it charged and suddenly you have a TV with lot of possibilities and all the information close enough to the user to be used.

The biggest issue of smart tv is not the input devices, but software. Will Tv manufacturers provide updates once a year for 10-20 years. We buy TV's to last at least a decade. In 10 years will I still be getting security and software updates for my TV?

Take a look at android fragmentation and update issues by manufactuers and remember there is no standard SmartTV OS. I would be willing to bet the smart TV you buy today wont get security patches next year.

I significantly disagree. TV manufacturers not updating their software is A major problem but not THE major problem. If they don't update their firmware, does the product fail to work? No. It just works the same. The failure, or rather DISINTEREST, in updating firmware is a completely different problem than this article is on about. Your average user has no idea why their computer needs software updates - you think you could explain to them why their TV needs one?

THE problem is still the controller. And the problem with the controller is attempting to maintain legacy and a billion other factors. What remotes - standardization of remotes - for big fancy smart TVs need is what specialty remotes have been toying with and that is a smart screen. Now, before anyone gets bent out of shape - think about it. Who is NOT using a smart screen for basically everything? Everyone knows how a smart screen works. All the fancy menus and whatever for a smart TV should be navigable through the smart screen on the smart remote. Now some one is going to argue you still need buttons for basic stuff - "You can't pick up a smart screen remove and intuitively change a channel or volume." Correct, sir. Then half and half it. Make a "clamshell" where the smart screen is inside and on the outside shell are the basic functionality buttons or make a half and half screen with the numerals and volume and channel and power on half of the remote with a touch on the rest.

How do the problems you outline not apply to Roku, Boxee, Apple TV, Playstation, XBox, Wii, Ouya and every other device trying to do apps on TV? All those devices have the same remote or gesture input that you discuss - except the Wii, which you also fail to mention even tho it probably had the best, most innovative input in the pointing of the Wii-mote. The only apps people care about are Netflix and Pandora (and the like, hulu, amazon streaming, spotify, etc) and the Wiimote is still a really cool way to navigate Netflix.

"But TVs feel like babies, and we’re the parents who have taught them to say and mean the word “dada.” Now the baby is trying to write a dissertation on the human condition as informed by usage of Hulu and Netflix. It hurts to watch. It’s not going to work."

Does this make the Xbox a toddler? After you critique all the input methods, you fail to mention how any of the very obvious competitions match up. Has Roku done a better job somehow?

This is not a 'smart tv problem' this is an app-on-a-tv problem. It's arguably more of a problem for Boxee/Ouya/Roku then it is for LG and Samsung, who are far more dependent on UI for sales, since that is their product.

"It's clear from the marketing that companies want smart TVs to be the center of a home."

It's not clear and it's not true.Building in a Boxee/Ouya/Ruko (BOR) knock off is dirt cheap, and gives them an interactive branding platform. I really think that TV OSs are mostly designed to be used in the Best Buy showroom, not your living room. Your display already is the center of attention. These guys are selling displays, not platforms. You've mistaken a derivative marketing scheme for a legitimate attempt to innovate.

it's already been said, but just for the sake of it, here it goes:

These features are all marketing driven drivel that add little to the base cost of a unit while giving sexy pictures to put on the box.

Everything these guys do it derivative, because they know their platform only competes with devices you don't own. If you have a Roku, do you really use LG's Netflix app? Of course not. Even more true if you have an Xbox with a Live account.

The TV itself as a device has no intrinsic platform based benefit, when compared to specialized boxes.

Nobody is making purpose built apps beyond over the top media access, which everyone has, ie Netflix.

You're whole tie in to 'IPTV' also completely misses the point, and actually confuses this article significantly. When you critique these remotes, you seem to want to sometimes limit the scope to just the TV device itself, but at other times expand it to include the set-top box / DVR:

"IPTV’s emergence preceded the smart TV. While the term has more to do with how content is served than what the TV does, it’s a close relative on the user end. Time-shifted viewing and interaction with broadcasts created more options, requiring more controls and complicating the interaction between a TV and a viewer."

Except the cable card no set top box future that 5 years old article describes never happened, so in fact, they are not 'close relatives' at all, as my Sony Bravia or LG flatscreen shares no 'DNA' with my DirectTV/TWC/Comcast DVR / Receiver, and nobody is doing a TV with a DVR in it....

You also miss the fact that the single remote problem was somewhat solved by manufacture's themselves, if you have a stack from 1 manufacturer. Sony TV + Sony Receiver + Sony Blu-Ray (DVD/VCR) player, you can use just 1 Sony remote to drive them all, and it's been that way since like the 80s.

At not point do you question what kinds of apps should be developed, instead critiquing their failure to perform well at a task they were destined to fail. So yes, big, far away screens with tiny remotes make bad tablets. Perhaps the answer is not to try and find a way to make interacting with tablet ports better, but to instead develop apps that actually generate a useful experience that is unique to their context.

Haven't we always know that web browsers suck on TV? It's not news that they still do, and it's not news they they never really will be any good at it. Gestures and keyboards won't help.

Here is the real state of the state:Flatscreens are brutally competitive marketing wise, so even tho users are mostly shopping for pure displays, there is little to differentiate products based on pure display, especially at a given price point. The market for BORing over the top service delivery is actually boring, because receiving an h.264 stream just is not special or fancy anymore.

From updates to the lack of DVE hardware (to scale the HDMI signal freeing up real estate, like your set-top box does when you are in guide) to the lack of app stores and support infrastructure, the TV itself is the app platform of last resort. That is OK tho, because Netflix and Pandora work, and nothing else is actually useful to anyone. At least the game consoles will have the hardware to do the scaling and other nice bits - these always have been and will remain the premiere apps-on-TV devices, with $99 doohickies and in-set apps being the 2nd and 3rd tiers.

Which is to say, the point you really seemed to miss is that porting tablet apps to TV is 'popular' because it's cheap and easy, not because it's any good. From Roku to LG, all the platforms are dumb, not smart. The 'smart' apps users want on TVs have to do with watching TV, and otherwise extending and interacting with an experience. Your TV never has any idea what you are watching, so it will always be Dumb. It can't stream your Gears of War play via Twitch, it can't load custom tickers over ESPN or CNBC, it won't let you pause DVR playback of Game of Thrones and access metadata about onscreen characters. These are the kinds of Smart features users actually want from their TV experience, and in the end, the display will always be too dumb to be able to provide them.

Although it has about as much to do with 'IPTV' as my wifi Router does with streaming my Slingbox, the truth is that the DVR / receiver is really the hardware platform where TV can get smart. Most of that hardware is leased, so there is ROI on providers updating, and they can manage permissions and access so that the extra features are available to subscribers. The system would be monetized and would benefit both the networks, like ESPN and HBO, as well as the the providers, by increasing retention and bundling advanced features for subscribers.

On the whole this one really missed the mark - it seems like you guys came out of the gate gunning for this one niche without bothering to look at the greater media context. In so far as you critique the remote as a UI device, your limiting of that critique, half heartedly, to just TVs and not the larger ecosystem, especially the digital one, makes it look like you are picking favorites by ignoring painfully obvious and relevant comparisons.

The biggest issue of smart tv is not the input devices, but software. Will Tv manufacturers provide updates once a year for 10-20 years. We buy TV's to last at least a decade. In 10 years will I still be getting security and software updates for my TV?

Take a look at android fragmentation and update issues by manufactuers and remember there is no standard SmartTV OS. I would be willing to bet the smart TV you buy today wont get security patches next year.

Exactly. I would much rather have a small, relatively cheap device based on a standard OS (preferably open source), which can be replaced every few years. Ouya is looking quite promising in this regard

I want my TV to be as dumb as possible, and focus on a big screen with good image quality. Put the smarts in something with a more rapid replacement/upgrade cycle.

Personally, I don't want a TV. I want my TV to be a massive monitor capable of accepting input from my cable box, PS3, XBox and their successors. It does not need to be smart, it needs to display a picture from something that is smart and display it well.

The one feature that comes close to being a smart TV that I would actually like is for it to be able to use my smartphone as a remote. That way I wouldn't have to worry about losing the remote all the time.

Tablets and phones are only interesting for the smart TV features, they suck as actual tv remotes. Thanks to a touchscreen you have to look on to the screen to change channels, change Volume or get info panel, the only tablet remotes that are somewhat useful are those who display the content on the tablet directly. Every time i see a concept with only a few buttons it doesn't work properly, because everything that isn't a button has to be in some sort of menu, and it's not fun to have to open 3 sub menus while the show is running just to change the language..... or record it

Quiet Desperation wrote:

The remotes are designed by certified misanthropes. I've had tiny pause and stop buttons right next to one another. I've had a backstep button millimeters away from the power button. Tiny FF and Rewind buttons straddling the stop button. Some you have to swear were *deliberately* designed to be annoying. Then everyone bashes Apple for at least trying over the years to make nice interfaces. This is the world you wrought, tech geeks. Live with it.

salamanderjuice wrote:

Ugh, based off the Apple TV I'd rather they really didn't. The Apple TV remote to me is perhaps the worst I've ever used, too small so it easily falls between the couch cushions if your not careful, buttons that are overly hard to push, too few buttons. Even the software is meh at best. It doesn't have a better interface at youtube or netflix than the 360 or PS3 and for me at least the netflix has routine connection errors but only on the Apple TV.

These posts are spot-on when it comes to the real-world use case of TV remotes. There really is a minimum number of properly spaced/shaped physical buttons that you need for (effective) menu navigation and media control, along with a minimum physical size and weight for in-hand grip and balance. Using a touch screen for basics like volume control is major fail here, just as much as they are for automotive applications. Credit card-style thin remotes and touch screens I'm looking at you...

Computer mice are an example of what I'm on about physical in-hand size and weight. Yes you can make tiny little things, but there is a minimum where ergonomics and usability start to be severely compromised. Sure, somebody will mention all the low/no-button "touch" mice but they have a relatively tiny number of inputs relative to what you need in a TV media consumption device, along with relatively massive functional "button" areas. The old Apple iMac hockey puck mice are a great example of massive fail here.

The Tivo "Glo" and "Slide" remotes are user interface and industrial design works of art and a whole different plane than 99% of anything else on the market. Use one for any length of time and you'll know what I'm on about.

I just want my TV to provide a stellar picture with low power consumption and be able to expose itself to any number of devices I may already have. Why can't I stream some things wirelessly over a Bluetooth connection to it (or some other type of standard communications channel)? Granted I'm not familiar with the spec and it probably couldn't support HD content or anything like that. But as an example, we needed to buy a baby monitor. It consisted of a camera and a small screen. Why do I need to buy another screen? Why couldn't that camera just use my TV, or smart phone, or tablet? My point being is that there is too much overlap and redundancy in the things we buy, and this article is a further example of this. Let's face it, you could build a nice PC and stick it in your living room and it would be able to do everything you want now and in the future with software upgrades and you don't' have to rely on the manufacturer to provide updates or rewrite existing apps.

I'm not interested in having Angry Birds built in to my TV (this does exist, you wave your hand in front of the built in camera as the control). Other boxes already excel in this area of connectivity (PS3, Roku, PC, etc.). I consider myself a tech guy and I still don't understand why I would want this functionality. I have Netflix built into my TV, and you would think that would be easier to use, but it's slow and clunky and I would rather turn on my PS3 and use that Netflix app.

This is actually so many fold its hard to say where to begin. input needs to be easy. A standard Remote does everything it can to make standard input difficult. Likewise full keyboards make navigation on a TV just as difficult. connecting a tablet to a TV seems like the answer and it could be but it needs to be a proper two way experience. seamlessly converging the TV and Tablet experience and combinging with Kinect Like gestures will help but it HAS to be seamless. when you have the ability to integrate and XBMC, Xbox360 Smart TV and Tablet in one seamless experience then you may have something but until an XBMC experience and TV channel or content selection is has no blur convergence lines none of this will change meaningfully.

I just want my TV to provide a stellar picture with low power consumption and be able to expose itself to any number of devices I may already have. Why can't I stream some things wirelessly over a Bluetooth connection to it (or some other type of standard communications channel)? Granted I'm not familiar with the spec and it probably couldn't support HD content or anything like that. But as an example, we needed to buy a baby monitor. It consisted of a camera and a small screen. Why do I need to buy another screen? Why couldn't that camera just use my TV, or smart phone, or tablet? My point being is that there is too much overlap and redundancy in the things we buy, and this article is a further example of this. Let's face it, you could build a nice PC and stick it in your living room and it would be able to do everything you want now and in the future with software upgrades and you don't' have to rely on the manufacturer to provide updates or rewrite existing apps.

What you are describing as overlap is "necessary self-support." If it didn't come with a screen, you would have to own one that could interface with the camera - and if you didn't, you would have to buy one. That is not redundancy. That's like asking "Why does my laptop need to come with a screen?"

This is why I prefer to still by a 'regular' (read: non-smart TV) and hook up things to it. On our TV downstairs we have a Blue-Ray player with wifi so we can do everything with a smart TV from it. Across the hall, an Apple TV. Upstairs? An ultra-small, 5 year old computer. If anything gets outdated or is no longer supported, the cost of replacing or upgrading those devices are minimal.

I think TV manufacturers should be looking at what we connect to the TV's and fostering how those connections could be improved. Say I buy an LG TV and LG Blue-Ray player, those two should be able to talk better to each other.

They know this, that is why the software in the TV is just a cheap knockoff, or in the case of Sony, the Netflix app ont he Blu-Ray and the TV is probably the same. In any case, it's super cheap to add this stuff, and helps in marketing. Really, most of the 45in LCDs out there have screens from same factories, regardless of brand, so these lil OSs are more about differentiating products then they are about delivering services.

Note that all device manufactures have some kind of interlinking:

Panasonic's is call Viera, Sony has compatibility in the Bravia line, etc. The remotes are usually compatible as well, but I think in the end this is being replaced by the OSs. No need to for the Blu-Ray and the TV to communicate, if they both offer all the same services.

What you are describing as overlap is "necessary self-support." If it didn't come with a screen, you would have to own one that could interface with the camera - and if you didn't, you would have to buy one. That is not redundancy. That's like asking "Why does my laptop need to come with a screen?"

This is also why consumer electronics, external HDDs, and cell phones ship with things like composite cables, power cords, and USB cables.

Smart TV's are not needed when you already have DVD/BluRay players that can stream content from the internet s well as video gaming consoles which can do a better job. I'm also seeing a comeback of the HTPC. I have had more and more people asking me to build them a HTPC. TV's should be left to do what they do bast. Most people I know who bought a Smart TV regret it.

HTPCs still suffer from the loosely associated parts flying in irregular formation. In other words not a seamless experience.

No such thing as a "seamless" experience. HTPC's work great. Far less codec and compatibility issues with online streaming services. These "smart" appliances suffer from both at a high rate.

What you are describing as overlap is "necessary self-support." If it didn't come with a screen, you would have to own one that could interface with the camera - and if you didn't, you would have to buy one. That is not redundancy. That's like asking "Why does my laptop need to come with a screen?"

This is also why consumer electronics, external HDDs, and cell phones ship with things like composite cables, power cords, and USB cables.

*etc stuff about Roku, Apple TV, and Boxy and other multimedia sharing products*

And what is the market saturation of those? Or even all of them combined?

I have no hard data, but I have never been bullish on them, and this is part of the reason. The TV guys will eat their low end lunch by adding all the same features for free, and these guys don't have the capital to make a run at MS or Sony in the console market, which can clearly duplicate all the same functionality at least as well, as well as offer long term support and warranties, etc.

Panasonic's is call Viera, Sony has compatibility in the Bravia line, etc. The remotes are usually compatible as well, but I think in the end this is being replaced by the OSs. No need to for the Blu-Ray and the TV to communicate, if they both offer all the same services.

What you're seeing is actually called CEC (Consumer Electronics Control) over HDMI and part of the HDMI(tm) licensed specification. Everything is compatible, regardless of branding, as long as it has the HDMI logo.

*etc stuff about Roku, Apple TV, and Boxy and other multimedia sharing products*

And what is the market saturation of those? Or even all of them combined?

I have no hard data, but I have never been bullish on them, and this is part of the reason. The TV guys will eat their low end lunch by adding all the same features for free, and these guys don't have the capital to make a run at MS or Sony in the console market, which can clearly duplicate all the same functionality at least as well, as well as offer long term support and warranties, etc.

The question to answer then is why shouldn't TVs be able to access Netflix or Hulu+ or whatever? Why should you need a secondary device? The answer is you shouldn't. Unlike console video games, those don't require dedicated hardware development. Think about it, why does it make sense to ding TVs for having Netflix capability while glossing over the fact that consoles have it? Why should consoles and not tvs?

I just spent a very frustrating hour last night reprogramming my Harmony remote after I made the simple change of replacing a TV in my not very sophisticated setup of TV+Windows Media Center + A/V receiver + Wii. While Logitech's software for setting up a system from the start is pretty easy, swapping out components pretty much requires you to start over. Plus, I can't find an easy way to remove a component from an 'action'. For example, when I want to play games on the Wii, I don't want to change whatever the WMC box is doing. Unfortunately, the Harmony software requires that I set the WMC box to do 'something'. So although the WMC is not involved (just the TV and A/V receiver), the remote still requires that it send a command to the WMC box. Not very well thought out.

The problem with consumer electronics that is pushing the companies to go "smart" and "connected" is the same one that all the ISPs are chasing.

Your ISP doesn't want to become a dumb pipe that you buy services from 3rd parties over. Your TV is trying to prevent becoming a big monitor. Your blu ray player is trying to prevent becoming a DVD-ROM. Your receiver is trying to stay relevant. All of them wants to become the integration point for your entertainment center.

The frustrating part is that I want my ISP to be a fast dumb pipe, and I want my TV to be a big dumb screen. I want the thing that sits between the fast dumb pipe and the big dumb screen to be under my control, use standardized protocols, and run open source software. I want it to be my device, not the ISP's device, and not the TV manufacturer's device. I want it to record content in a standardized non-DRMed format on my NAS, not in some locked-down format on an internal hard drive of a device approved by the content companies

The Supreme Court ruled that VCRs were legal, and aside from the crappiness of analog recording quality, things just worked pretty well. Once digital tuners/capture cards (for analog signals) were available, things were quite good for a while until the switch to encrypted HD digital signals. Now we're stuck with a mess of incompatible systems that have to be approved by the content companies. If the content companies had had their way, we never would have even had VCRs. DRM needs to go away

Panasonic's is call Viera, Sony has compatibility in the Bravia line, etc. The remotes are usually compatible as well, but I think in the end this is being replaced by the OSs. No need to for the Blu-Ray and the TV to communicate, if they both offer all the same services.

What you're seeing is actually called CEC (Consumer Electronics Control) over HDMI and part of the HDMI(tm) licensed specification. Everything is compatible, regardless of branding, as long as it has the HDMI logo.